A −187.7‐FoM V‐band low‐power CMOS VCO using modified f T ‐doubler with current‐reused technique

A modified f T ‐doubler with current‐reused technique is proposed to realize a low power and low phase noise V‐band voltage controlled oscillator (VCO) in a standard 1P9M 90‐nm CMOS. The proposed technique not only increases the operation frequency but also reduces the DC power consumption at millimeter‐wave frequencies. The short circuit unity gain frequency f T of the modified f T ‐doubler yields a 31% improvement compared to that of conventional one. Measurement result shows that the designed VCO achieves a phase noise of −115.4 dBc/Hz at 10‐MHz offset under a low power consumption of 2 mW. The figure‐of‐merit is up to −187.7 dBc/Hz. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Microwave Opt Technol Lett 57:1752–1755, 2015